Forthcoming trips, camps & speakers

Details of trips and camps will be advised in the monthly ’What’s on?’, which is emailed to Botanical Society members in the first week of the month, and on this website closer to the time. Members, please sign up using the link in the latest ‘What’s on?’. Non-members and prospective members are welcome but please email nelsonbotanicalsociety@gmail.com for details.

Sunday 19 July
Field trip: Kaka Hill forest, Rainy River
Organiser: Emma Tyson
Botanical leader: Cathy Jones

This 120-ha property owned by Dean Walker is located among tributaries of the Rainy River in the Motupiko sub-catchment of the Motueka catchment. The property ranges in altitude from 340 to 610 metres above sea level on moderately steep (15˚ to 25˚) lowland hill-country. The New Zealand Forest Service Mapping Series 6 describes the vegetation type as rimu - general hardwoods – beeches.  Walls and Simpson (2004) describe the vegetation type as lowland beech forest, being beech forest below 600 metres above sea level. It is incised by an approximately 2 km long northeast-facing gully that runs up to its headwaters and a southeast-facing hillslope above Big Gully Stream (known locally as Horopito Stream). There are also several alluvial river flats beside Horopito Stream, which more or less forms the southeast boundary of the forest.  

We last visited in January 2011 and Dean warns that it is very cold there in winter so make sure you have plenty of warm gear.

Monday 20 July
Evening talk: Pūtangitangi Greenmeadows Centre, 233 Songer Street, Stoke, 7.30 pm
Speaker: Anthony Wright
Topic: Two weeks on Ma’uke: A botanist in the middle of the Pacific

This is the illustrated talk that Anthony had prepared for us when he came up to present the Allan Mere to Shannel last year. Our celebrations of Shannel’s achievements deservedly stole the limelight, and Anthony agreed to return to deliver his talk.

Anthony has been regularly visiting the Cook Islands for 20 years and for the last 15 has been actively documenting the flora, initially by photography. Once it became apparent that he was finding new records of plants for the archipelago – 15 tiny jewels of islands scattered across 2.25 million square kilometres of ocean – he became a research associate of the Cook Islands Natural Heritage Trust and was permitted to collect voucher herbarium specimens to permanently document new taxonomic and distributional records. Some 3,000 specimens and 10,000 labelled photos later, he’s getting a bit of a feel for the flora of the main island, Rarotonga. In more recent years, he has been participating in intensive two-week stints on some of the outer islands, where, with a couple of colleagues, a bioblitz-type approach is taken. The summer before last, Ma’uke was the chosen isle, and Anthony will take us on a journey through the people, plants and places of this remote piece of paradise.

Labour Weekend camp, 23–26 October, Golden Bay

There has been a change of plan for the Labour Weekend camp as we can no longer get the original accommodation planned at Awaroa.  Instead, we will organise a camp at Golden Bay where there are a variety of places and ecosystems to visit. We had a very enjoyable camp in the area in 2021.  More details to come later but please indicate your interest in this camp as accommodation will need to be booked soon – members by putting your name on the sign-up sheet (link in What’s On?) and others by emailing nelsonbotanicalsociety@gmail.com.

Camp, 11–14 December, Arthur’s Pass

We have booked the Arthur’s Pass Outdoor Education Centre for this camp as it is a facility that can accommodate a large group and is very central. We need to have at least 26 people to keep the cost per person to $40 per night, so please indicate your interest as soon as possible – members by putting your name on the sign-up sheet (link in What’s On?) and others by emailing nelsonbotanicalsociety@gmail.com.